Self Worth Series - Part 3 | Pastor Paul McGee

Thank you Lord, for your goodness, your mercy, Lord,

Hallelujah, Amen. Saturday is the Section 5 rally

at 1:00 PM. It's 12O clock our time, 1:00 PM

Eastern Standard Time in Sullivan IN for the Scots Church

and desire to go a little bit over an hour of a trip.

Hey man, I know that you'd be blessed by doing so.

Then on Sunday we have the gardeners here with us on that

Sunday morning. One service AM service only.

All right, next Wednesday is our last lesson here in our self

worth series. Amen as well.

And that will be within the month of October.

This this month's about over going to be turning to 2nd

Corinthians chapter 12. Second Corinthians chapter #12

And let me read in just a few verses of Scripture here.

The Bible says this is Paul. He says, And lest I should be

exalted above measure through the abundance of the

revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh,

messenger of Satan, to buffet me, lest I should be exalted

above measure. For this thing I besought the

Lord thrice, that it might depart from me.

He said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee, for my

strength is made perfect in weakness.

Most gladly, therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities,

that the power of Christ may rest upon me.

Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, and reproaches, and

necessities, and persecutions and distresses for Christ's

sake. For when I am weak, then am I?

Paul's going to talk to us about some pretty tremendous things

that he experienced, but makes the field level whenever he also

talks about something about him that he said, this is a thorn.

That's the way he described it. All right.

And so I want to, for title purposes, just call this

imperfectly perfect. Imperfectly perfect.

Amen. Tonight let's go to the Lord and

for ask him to help us. Father, I need you this evening,

God. I'm grateful, Lord, for another

opportunity. God, I don't want to Lord Jesus,

squander. Lord God, this time I want to

Lord invest in it and turn my mind and my attention towards

you and understand what a privilege, God that it is.

I pray, O Lord, that someone be helped.

Lord someone would be encouraged Lord by your word God that would

find some place in our hearts and our lives.

God that we we made better by it the lovely name of the Lord

Jesus Christ that I pray Amen and Amen.

It may be seated tonight in Jesus name.

A little bit of the background for 2nd Corinthians 12 for that

matter, for really the past few chapters of Second Corinthians.

And the Church of Corinth is special to Paul because Paul

founded the church at Corinth in Acts chapter #18 you can read

about that. But he founded the church at

Corinth. But over time, as he did, he was

missionary churches and he established churches all

throughout different places. And so he would go to them and

then come back around to them and check on them.

And over time, in his absence, there were some false prophets

that arose at the Church of Corinth and in the city of

Corinth. And these false prophets begin

to undermine Paul's authority. They begin to undermine his

authority and they begin to undermine his message.

As a matter of fact, they went to the extent according to

Scripture, and you can read them in Corinthians, they went to the

extent that they even attacked Paul's credentials and they

attacked his character, if I could say it like this, in many

regards, they challenged his self worth.

They used all the societal standards of their area and

their day to judge his leadership.

And thus they also then criticize Paul's appearance and

that we'll go to a verse here real quick that shows that they

criticize Paul's appearance. And remember the society

standard right is your performance and other people's

opinion. So they're criticized Paul's

appearance, all right, That's that's opinions of people and

his speech performance. The Bible says in 2nd

Corinthians 1010, these words for his letters say they the

they that's been referred to are these false prophets.

They say say they hit for his letters Speaking of Paul's

letters, say they these false prophets, his letters, post

letters are weighty and powerful, but Paul's bodily

presence is weak and his speech contemptible, which means that

his speech was nothing. His speech was the least

esteemed. And so in the Greco Roman world

in which all of this is set in, it was not uncommon for them to

boast about themselves, to present their credibility to

whomever they were trying to present it to.

And so given that the apostle Paul in verse #1 urges us not

to, not to be eager to glory, not to be in a hurry to boast.

But while boasting was widespread in that culture, Paul

does it just a little differently.

And understand the reason why Paul's doing this is because

people have attacked his credibility.

They have attacked even his character, his speech, his

performance. And so he, he, he's trying to

reposition himself in the eyes of the Church of Corinth, Amen,

of being valid concerning what he had said, what he had taught

so and so forth. And so Paul does go to bat for

himself to a certain degree, but he does this just a little

differently. He, he boasts in a indirect way.

He, he boasts with some restraint.

He speaks about himself in the first several verses of chapter

#12 in the third person he talks about how I knew a man in

Christ. When he's talking about himself,

he talks about I knew such a man and he's talking about himself,

Amen. We have some people that like to

speak to them about themselves in third person, Amen.

Even around the church, Hallelujah.

Talk about himself. He's talking about he knew such

a man that was caught up into the 3rd heaven.

He was talking about himself, hearing unspeakable things.

So he was taking a very indirect, indirect route to

glory or boast, or if you will give some credibility to

himself. Yet we also understand that Paul

does, as we've already seen in these past two lessons.

He does as he he recommended in Romans 12/3 that we looked at

last week, that we shouldn't think too higher of herself.

Yes, he he admonished us that we should think soberly, think

soberly with with with a balance moderately.

And so as Paul Speaking of himself in the third person

about some of these wondrous things that he had experienced

and he had heard and whether in the body or out of the body, he

says I cannot tell. All these things He includes

then with these unique experiences, he includes what he

may even consider to his weakness.

A man included in with all of these boasts.

He's he's very brutally honest and he says this this thing that

he calls in Scripture thorn. Please note that's something

that Paul has identified that as that God didn't identify it as

that Paul identified it as that this thing that was a thorn.

The Bible says it's something that was given to him basic

terms in in in some regards, this sister Sheila, this was a

gift, but by his initial estimation, he calls it a thorn.

Amen. And so Paul didn't, he doesn't

identify for us where the thorn came from.

I know he says the messenger of Satan, but what he's talking

about, he's given other description about what this is

to him. To him, this is like a messenger

of Satan to buffet him. He's given other descriptions

about what this is in his life that's been given to him, but he

identifies as a thorn and identifies as a messenger of

Satan to to to buff at him. So he doesn't tell us where it

came from, but he does. He does let us in on his

discontent with it by his labelings of it all right.

And furthermore than in verse #8 his three times petitioning

heaven that it might depart from him, that it might be removed

from him, but all of his petition to no avail, it was

still there with him. Let me ask you something

tonight. Have you ever been desperately

unhappy about any part of yourself that you wish that you

could change? Paul was dealing with something

like that. He was discontented with what

this was was discontented with it.

To buff it means to smite with the hen than to mouth tree in

any way. He says that this is a messenger

saying to to buff at me. He says that this this feels

like it just constantly slapping me and then I'm mistreated by

this. And we understand that Paul is

not comfortable. He calls it a thorn.

A thorn is anything that this is the Greek language, anything

that is pointed or sharp. I know that's real deep, but

that just also relays his discomfort with whatever it is.

It's sharp to him, it's pointed to him, It's defined as a sharp

state. We we have a meaning here of

even impale and crucify because the same word, a different

little nuance form of that same Greek word means to impale or to

crucify. Paul's letting us know this

isn't comfortable. This is what I have.

And these definitions no doubt explain to us his aversion to

it. And so at this particular point

then in the narrative of the scripture, it becomes should

come very deeply personal even for us or anyone who has

struggled with what you call a imperfection that you wish you

could change. Some of us have aspects of our

lives, whether it's in the appearance, whether it's in

personality, whether it's in our ability that we would, if we

could be popped for a moment, say that is a thorn in my flesh.

You could fill in the blank. It might be an appearance thing

in your estimation. It might be something about your

personality. It might be some ability or

inability. You might say that is a thorn in

my flesh. And so Paul's experience here in

Scripture is going to remind us that God's response to those

things that we call thorns, we do we call thorns and we call

messengers of Satan to buffet us.

God's response to us is this. I'm not here to remove that.

I'm to give you grace with that. Our Kent Smith just recently in

a book that I read called Sock Drawer Theology.

Our Kent Smith said he said your imperfections are really

personal perfections of a master creator who has great plans for

life. I didn't even go so far and

maybe it is, maybe it isn't, but Jesus isn't even just

necessarily whenever he says my grace is sufficient for you and

my strength doesn't make perfect in weakness.

Jesus even isn't necessarily calling Paul's thorn weakness as

much as he's addressing Paul's attitude toward him.

And so there's various opinions. And it was his house prophets

that we're calling in charge, his performance.

And we're very opinionated about him.

What, what, what if his thorn in the flesh was a skewed view of

his self worth? It's all unknown.

I can't prove anything tonight. It's all unknown.

But it's not necessary to know what Paul Thorn was because I

believe the uncertainty of it is the purpose of it.

What this means for me, Sister Cruise, is that your thorn may

not be my thorn, but it's still something pointed and sharp,

something it's, it's considered very uncomfortable to my life,

very uncomfortable my life. The times were like the nursery

rhyme of Humpty Dumpty. Everybody remember the nursery

rhyme? You remember the nursery?

Thank you, lady. Humpty Dumpty, Humpty Dumpty,

all the kings and all the kings couldn't put.

You know, there's nothing that explicitly states that Humpty

Dumpty was an egg. There's nothing in that nursing

line says he was an egg. That is traditionally what we've

associated with this rhyme for generations.

Everybody's laughing over that. But it is.

There's nothing explicitly said it.

Humpty could be me or you. I don't know why Humpty sat on a

wall. I mean, come on, folks.

I don't know why Humpty was sitting on a wall and I don't

know what caused his fault. I don't know if it's caused by

somebody else. I don't know if he was careless

and he was the cause of his own fault.

I don't know. In her book Worthy, Jamie Kern

Lima said this, She said I read the rhyme.

Speaking of Humpty Dumpty, as only the King himself would have

been able to put Humpty back together.

Think about it. All the King's horses, but all

the King's men couldn't do it. Maybe because only the King

could do it. Paul Storn wasn't something that

the world or any human efforts could fix.

No, it was something that only God could work through the

display, His grace and the strength.

Look, God's response. This was God's response to what

Paul considered something very uncomfortable.

God says my grace is sufficient, which means enough, my grace is

enough. The Amplified Bible says that

life enables you to bear the trouble as you see it manfully

is how the Amplified says it. God's grace answers those

issues, those uncomfortable thorns as we may label them.

His grace answers those issues. His strength is made perfect in

our weakness, whether they are actual or perceived.

Christ's strength comes along and it's displayed.

We don't want to see this, but that thing that's uncomfortable

to me becomes a stage for the manifestation of God's strength.

Amen. This is a concept that I believe

we found in other places, the Scripture tonight.

It's a concept that's illustrated in the story of

Zacchaeus, or as some would say, Zacchaeus, Luke chapter 19 and

Luke 19 · chapter mention

verse #3 and he, Zacchaeus, sought to see Jesus who he was.

Is anybody having the little song go through their head right

now? Be honest.

This is a safe place, Amen. Sought to see Jesus who he was

and could not for the press because he was little of

stature. And he ran before and climbed up

into a Sycamore tree to see him Speaking of Jesus, for he was to

pass that way. And when Jesus came to the

place, he looked up and saw him and said and said, Zacchaeus,

make haste come down for today I must abide at thy house.

Zacchaeus or Zacchaeus was small in stature.

That can be a self issue, a self worth issue for some.

Nonetheless, due to that, it compelled him to climb a

Sycamore tree to see Jesus as he passed by.

And the Bible says Jesus saw him and then invited himself to

Zacchaeus's house. Now I'm not saying please don't

misunderstand me tonight. I'm not saying that this can

happen in under different conditions, but these are the

conditions the scripture says it did happen under.

What are you saying? I'm not saying if if he was like

9 feet tall that this couldn't have happened.

But that's not the conditions that the Bible provides for us

here purposefully. This event highlights that his

stature climb and Jesus looking up seeing him there in that

tree. We're all precursors to the

visit of the Lord at his house. Someone say Amen.

If it not been for Zacchaeus limitation, maybe he thought it

was a thorn. Maybe he thought it was a

messenger of Satan. To be short, maybe he had a self

issue with it. If it wasn't for his limitation,

he probably would have not have climbed the tree and therefore

may have not been noticed by Jesus.

He might have missed a tremendous opportunity if he had

just been average height. Like if there wasn't this nuance

of difference about him, he might have missed this grand

opportunity. Well, you're saying tonight

then, Pastor, I'm saying this. We, we need not, and rather

perhaps even we should be. Maybe it's what I should say not

not, but should. We should be careful that we

don't underestimate what we see as flaws or limitations because

these might be some of the very areas and things of our lives

that God says. I pick that for the stage of my

strength. I pick that to showcase, if you

will, my grace. We see other places in

Scripture, Old Testament, that Moses has a similar right.

You already know where I'm headed, don't you?

Moses has a similar experience in Exodus chapter #4 and verse

#10. And Moses said unto the Lord,

This is on the backside of the desert.

He's having this conversation with God, the burning Bush

episode. And Moses said unto the Lord, Oh

my Lord, I am not eloquent, neither heretofore nor since

thou hast spoken unto thy servant, but I am slow of speech

and of a slow tongue. We realized very quickly that

Moses insecurity is in how he talks.

Admittedly, he says I'm not eloquent.

I'm slow of speech, I'm slow of tongue.

Stop here for a moment. In order for something to be

called slow, that has to be relative to something else.

You you just don't just slow and you have a slow is relative to

something as compared to what Comparison is made in order for

something to be deemed slow. Huh.

So so evidently in his mind there's some type of accepted

standard norm opinion to be able to speak of himself.

My speech is slow. Let's even look.

Do you understand what I'm saying?

The reason why, the reason why that we gauge ourselves as we do

is that we got some type of standard or norm or opinion

that's out there that we are measuring ourself by.

Rich ports, measured by standard.

Pretty ugly. It's measured by standard.

Fat, skinny, it's measured by standard.

And so whenever we come then into the New Testament in the

book of Acts, and Stephen is recalling the story of Moses,

all right, Stephen's going to be stoned, but he's recalling the

story of Moses in Acts 7. Stephen says something different

about Moses. The Bible says in Acts 7 and

verse 22, and Moses was learned. This is Stephen saying this in

all the wisdom of the Egyptian and was mighty in what?

Mighty in words and in deeds. The 1st 40 years of Moses's life

in Egypt, being educated by Egypt.

The 2nd 40 years of Moses's life spent on the backside of the

desert. And that's where God came to

him. There in chapter #4 that I

already read to you. And he said, I have a slow

speak. That's where God came to him and

commanded him. I want you to return to Egypt

and I want you to be a deliverer for the people of Israel.

Listen to me. But before Moses said I'm not

eloquent and I'm slow as speech. Steven in the New Testament is

referencing a moment and saying that this same man that said

he's slow in speech, according to Stevens estimation, said he's

mighty in words. The word mighty means able.

The word mighty means to be able to do something or capable to do

something. Moses says I can't.

Moses says I'm slow of speech. Stephen says he's mighty in

words. He's capable of doing it.

What does that do? It highlights a notable gap

between Moses self perception and then how others people

perceived him. And God wanted to use Moses's

perceived speech difficulty to display his power, but Moses

allowed his insecurity in some regards to dominate his actions.

We read in the book of Numbers chapter 20, God had a

Numbers 20 · chapter mention

conversation with Moses. The children of Israel were

lacking water. God says, I have a means for

them to get water. Moses, I want you.

We'll read it here in just a bit.

I want you to speak to the rock in the New Testament.

We understand that rock, that all of them was Christ.

He says, but I want you to speak to the rock.

What did Moses do? Smoke the rock twice.

Look at it. Numbers 20, verse 7 And the Lord

Numbers 20:7

spake unto Moses, Say in verse 8, Take the rod, and gather thou

the assembly together, thou and Aaron thy brother, and speak ye

unto the rock before their eyes, and it shall give forth his

water, and that shall bring them to bring forth to them.

Water out the rock. So thou shalt give the

congregation, and there be strength.

When we get down to verse 11, then we have the action.

And Moses didn't lift up his voice.

Moses lifted up his hand, and with his rod he smote the rock

twice, and water came out abundantly, and the congregation

drank, and their beasts also. Please know that the

congregation doesn't know any difference between what was

supposed to be done and what was done.

They benefited nonetheless. But Moses knew.

Moses knew God wanted Moses. That man that said, I'm not

eloquent, I'm slow to speak, I'm slow to God wanted him to use

that very thing that he thought was a thorn that was

insufficient, that was lacking that insecurity to be involved

in the miracle of water coming from a rock to showcase God's

power through a perceived weakness.

It would have been, it was it was a profound glorious moment

because water did come forth. But for Moses, it would have

been particularly a profound glorious moment.

And not only that, but some reassurance to him that that

very thing that you thought you was going to allow to keep you

from even be my deliverer. Look what else you're doing with

that. Many times we want to present to

God all these things that in our estimation is all put together

that's good and also great about us.

God. Check that out.

And what God wants are those parts that are thorns to you,

that's perceived weaknesses to you.

Listen, self worth isn't about denying we have weaknesses, but

it's our attitude, Paul said He learned to boast about them

rather than to deprecate. Or you ever heard people that

self deprecate? You know what, huh.

They they, they might, they, they might be of a a large

individual and they'll self deprecate with with jokes about

the size of people about themselves.

They're not, but they're not laughing.

I'm laughing. Christ may rest upon me.

He's saying that God because of all these things, God

Tabernacle. In those moments, I realized

that I'm not self reliant. I'm God reliant.

God is spreading himself over me.

Here's the magnificent thing. The thing that I have a hard

time with by myself. You know what God says?

Let me. I have a hard time with by

myself. You know what God says?

Let me cover that with myself. He he tabernacles over us.

Oh, I don't know. I you know, my face looks like,

you know, it caught on fire and someone stamped it out.

That's just the way it is. God says that's all right.

I'll Tabernacle over you, huh? So you don't have nothing to you

have nothing to be blamed about or anything to be insufficient

about, He said. Paul says, boy, if this is what

takes place, he said the night I take pleasure in those things,

whether they're actual or whether they're perceived, I

take pleasure in those things. These dire straits of sometimes

my body and my mind, I take pleasure in those things.

And we got to understand again. Remember this malady Paul called

a thorn, and he thought it needed to be dealt with?

That didn't need to be removed. But where Paul understood the

completeness of the display of God's power and strength in his

perceived weaknesses, even that despised part of himself.

You know what he says, Look at verse #10 when he starts talking

about the reproaches and the distress of that.

Note the change here. He says, I take pleasure.

Hold on, what's happened, what's happened?

I have to tell you what's happened.

Grace has came into the picture. Grace has helped somebody with

their self worth. The same person who said it's a

thorn, the messenger of Satan, remove it.

Now he's saying I take pleasure in it.

I didn't like that aspect of me, but now I take pleasure in that

aspect of me. I was hoping that that could get

removed or someone that somehow exchanged for something else.

In my estimation, that'd be better.

But now, because of God, I take pleasure in the same thing that

I used to hate. I take pleasure in the same

thing that I used to discount. I take pleasure in the same

thing that I wasn't comfortable with.

Amen, He says. I take pleasure, he said in this

mercy, he saw it now just as it was.

It was given to him as a gift, and Paul's now taking pleasure

in it as a gift because he says he knows whenever I take this

gift, by doing so, I'm inviting God's grace in God's strength on

this platform. What's changed?

His attitude, his perspective, The thorn.

Still thorn per SE, it's still what it is, but his attitude and

his perspective of it has changed.

The word translated as thorn, it encompasses the meaning of being

tied to a stake as a punishment. This is Paul, this was Paul's

view. This bodily, whatever it was,

this is punishment. I say, oh, brother McGee,

listen, sometimes we're just as equally severe about some

physical and personal differences in our lives that

doesn't meet what we consider this.

This is punishment. The gene pool of, of McVeigh,

you know, got on me. You understand what I'm saying?

This is punishment. I got.

We got that, that trout trait, you know, Roman, This is

punishment, physical, personal, whatever it is.

I want to remind you of something.

This came back to my mind. I want to remind you of

something that in Isaiah 53 it tells me that even Jesus our

Messiah, who would have doubt that his self worth it had

permitted. I'm reading from the new life

version of Isaiah 53 and two and you can read all the versions

they again. I just read this one because I

think it just makes it very plain and there are others that

saying that I didn't still love. He grew up before him like a

young plant, like a root out of dry ground.

He the heat. Speaking of his the suffering

servant, what is notably will become Christ, the Messiah.

He has no beautiful body and when we see him, there is no

beauty that we hire. That's the description of your

Lord and Savior if he would have allowed himself good to head

self good. Yet that's not what happened.

Through that, well, Isaiah basically tells us, is quite a

unimpressive appearance. Through that unimpressive

appearance, God manifested his greatest power, salvation for

all humanity. Paul's own truth is even

mirrored here that despite his thorn, he had revelations of

heavenly places and even through these these earthly limitations

that God's strength was revealed to him.

Folks. And I don't have much longer to

go. And you're, you're probably

happy about it. But nonetheless don't wish away

your what you call your thorn. Don't wish away your thorn.

Come on, matter of fact, I challenge you tonight when you

leave here, you go home, you get you out a sheet of paper and you

begin to write down what you consider your thorns, whether it

be physical ability, inability, personality aspects about you

that you could say honestly that I just really don't like.

I'm going to write that. Write down your thorns.

Don't, don't, don't wish them away because those very things

that you list are the places where God can and use as a

platform for the display of and when you believe you're not

enough. God's grace is enough for us and

perfectly perfect. We by our heads folks just got

to get honest with ourselves, right?

Get honest with ourselves. There will always be critics,

hear me, there will always be critics and you already know

this. But the difficulty in the

problem with most critics is that they are trying to deal

with something that there isn't. And the only way that they can

feel better about themselves is making somebody else feel bad

about themselves. And it feels as though it makes

them move one rung up on the ladder.

But it's very empty. It's really very empty for that

individual. That's the reason why that got

to keep on living the life of a critic and always being negative

toward other people talking about about other people because

it's the only way they can even have a moment where they feel OK

about themselves. But there's always going to be

the credit And listen, there are some people's standards you'll

never live up to and you weren't meant to.

But if you live up to the standard of what God has created

to you to be and has redeemed you for right, because I don't I

don't want to go through these four weeks and have painted with

such a broad brush that it's like, you know what don't care

about what anybody else thinks. And that includes God type of

you hearing me that that that that is just as unhealthy as as

as where we might be tonight. But what I'm saying is this,

that there there's going to be always the opinions and the

criticism and whenever it comes to our performance, listen,

there's going to be days we're going to do better than others.

That's just life. There's going to be days that

we're going to do better than others are going to be days that

maybe we had time to do better, lack of time maybe prevent us,

whatever. But there's just going to be

days that we're we're going to outperform ourselves and there's

other days we're going to underperform ourselves.

But the question is, in all of it, were you yourself?

They told us years ago, as young preachers said, whenever you

entered the pulpit, don't try to preach like anybody else,

because if you preach in the pulpit trying to be somebody

else, you've left the pulpit empty because you're not

yourself. The in the preaching world.

I just oh.